After seeing no appreciable job growth in the Pittsburgh metro area more than a year ago, the region added 10,700 jobs between June 2013 and June 2014, according to a report from Pittsburgh Today.
“That’s a 0.9 percent increase, which doesn’t set the world on fire, but Pittsburgh has always been kind of a slow and steady grower,” said Doug Heuck, Pittsburgh Today director. “But it’s good news that we’re back growing jobs again.”
The lack of job growth in 2013 had some concerned, as the region had been doing well following the recession, though as stated above, the growth has always been slow and steady.
“And that’s kind of our track record,” said Heuck. “Pittsburgh, because of our demographics, is not likely to be a place where there’s torrid job growth, but it is a place where it is relatively more stable in down times and in up times, it just doesn’t see the job growth that some of the hotter cities see.”
According to the report, jobs in transportation and utilities increased slightly. Other sectors did better.
“The hospitality industry has been doing really well,” Heuck said. “In fact, its growth of leisure and hospitality – up about 8.1 percent was the largest increase among all of the benchmark regions. Natural resources, mining, construction was also a good one – up 3.2 percent.”
Some sectors saw a decline in jobs, including slight drops in financial activities and government jobs. Manufacturing jobs declined by 3.2 percent, the second largest decline among the 15 benchmark regions.
“That’s an area to be concerned about because manufacturing – these are high-quality, typically high-paying jobs that had some degree of a multiplier effect in the economy,” said Heuck, “so we would wish that we’d see manufacturing jobs stabilize.”
Benchmark regions include Philadelphia, Boston, Cincinnati, Indianapolis and Charlotte.
